Miu Miu’s Scary Summer

BY TIM BLANKS

PARIS, France — “Summer is summer, the beach is the beach,” said Miuccia Prada cheerfully, explaining away the surreally seaside-y ambience of the new Miu Miu collection and show.
But if she was trying to suggest that there was no more to them than that, she failed miserably when she added the following: “They’re sunny but they’re scary. Because how much longer will we have them?” The sentiment sounded a touch environmental, but, years ago, there was a Prada collection which offered a post-nuclear beachscape as its primary graphic. The ability to isolate the strain of darkness in the midst of light is a long time Miuccia knack.
So if this collection had the superficial look of a 1960’s party in Forte dei Marmi, it was also a typically contrary Prada combination of kitsch, prim and racy, with princess coats and shirtdresses (tied in the back with a big bow) sharing catwalk space with ruched short shorts, shirred romper suits and printed latex coats.
The shoes, always a Miumiu fundamental, ran the same gamut: slides to platform sandals, flip-flops to wedges carved with seashells. There was typical perversity in flourishes like the anthurium bathing caps, the towelling stoles, or the terrycloth robes made from mink.
But that’s another Miuccia knack, to infuse the banal with a peculiar new insight. Frederic Sanchez played Siouxsie Sioux songs, enough to cast a chill over any sunny gathering. The Miumiu colour palette was also a tiny bit cold.  So it wasa scary beach. Which guaranteed that, if the collection wasn’t quite as extreme as it’s wont to be, it still preserved the edge of alluring oddness that always makes it Miu Miu.